WhatsApp CEO Jan Koum quits Facebook

Washington: WhatsApp co-founder, CEO and Facebook board member Jan Koum on Monday (local time) announced, in a post, that he is leaving the Facebook-owned company.

"It is time for me to move on . . . I'm taking some time off to do things I enjoy outside of technology, such as collecting rare air-cooled Porsches, working on my cars and playing ultimate frisbee," Koum said in his statement.

"And I'll still be cheering WhatsApp on -- just from the outside," the statement added.

Koum is departing from the company after clashing with Facebook over its attempts to weaken encryption and make use of user data, according to The Washington Post.

Techcrunch reported that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg commented on Koum's Facebook post about his departure, citing encryption as one of the things he learned a lot about from Koum.

"Jan: I will miss working so closely with you. I'm grateful for everything you've done to help connect the world, and for everything you've taught me, including about encryption and its ability to take power from centralized systems and put it back in people's hands. Those values will always be at the heart of WhatsApp," Zuckerberg wrote.

Koum leaves the company more than 9 years after he and Brian Acton created the messaging app.

He has been with Facebook since February of 2014, when Facebook acquired the messaging startup for $19 billion, according to the reports.

The tiff and Koum's departure come in the backdrop of Facebook's, massive data breach by the analytics company Cambridge Analytica.